Can't access server after moving metadata

Plex Media Server Desktops & Laptops
1

Server Version#:1.25.0.5282
Player Version#: N/A

I need some help before I do any more damage.

My Plex server is an HP ProDesk 600 G4 DM Mini. I wanted to move my metadata to a new 1TB NVME drive installed in the HP. I follow these instructions to the letter (or so I think). After deleting the original /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library contents I found that I wasn’t seeing any of my posters so I did a reboot. After the reboot I have major problems.

Initially I wasn’t able to access Plex through any player. In my browser I would just get a spinning wheel when accessing via IP address. Eventually, when accessing it via localhost using a browser on the server it was telling me that my server is unclaimed. Now, when I access it via ip address on a different computer it also wants me to do a server setup.

I’m sure I did something stupid and/or forgot something very basic.

Logs are attached. The main log is full of Network Service stuff, so I’m guessing it’s something there. It’s worth noting that my logs have been full of the Network Service: Error in browser handle read: 125 (Operation canceled) socket=-1 errors for a while now, but everything has worked fine.

It seems like the logs are also saying that it is still using /var/lib/plexmediaserver for the metadata location, rather than /home/plexdata on the new NVME drive.

Here is the contents of my plexmediaserver.service.d file.

#
# Customize Plex's config
[Service]
Environment="PLEX_MEDIA_SERVER_APPLICATION_SUPPORT_DIR=/home/plexdata/Library/Application Support"
#
# This is needed to change the default umask 
UMask=0002    # this must be 4 digits of octal

What should my next step be to try and get my server back up and running while using the new /home/plexdata location?

pmlogs.zip (863.9 KB)

EDIT: I did realize I could just copy the Library folder from /home/plexdata back to /var/lib/plexmedia server and now my server is back to where it was, but it still leaves the question of how to get it to use the /home/plexdata directory. Clearly I’m doing something wrong, but I can’t figure out what.

2

When you did the move,

# systemctl stop plexmediaserver
# mkdir /home/plexdata
# chown plex:plex /home/plexdata
# cd /var/lib/plexmediaserver
# tar cf -  . | (cd /home/plexdata ; tar xf -)
#

Now, with the override in place,

# systemctl daemon-reload
# systemctl start plexmediaserver

After you confirm it’s working


#  rm -rf /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library

How it works:

  1. Make the directory with ownership set to match
  2. ‘tar’ makes a perfect copy One does the reading from /ar/lib/plexmediaserver while the other ‘tar’ writes to where it goes. It’s far faster than cp because it’s doing independent reads and writes.
1 Like
3

Thanks for the quick response. I really thought I followed all the steps as you had them written, and used cut/paste for everything. I’ll give this another try from scratch tomorrow and try to pay very close attention to what I’m doing. I’ll report back on how it goes.

4

I wrote the above as “Copy/Paste” assuming you are already at ‘root’ (sudo bash)

change the chown to the appropriate username if you changed User= or Group= in the override. Also don’t forget to chown -R user:group /home/plexdata AFTER you finish the tar operation (to change ownership to the new username)

PS: DO NOT DELETE /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library until confirmed working

sudo systemctl status plexmediaserver
5

This is why I can’t have nice things.

I tried this again, following your steps very closely and only using copy/paste. It didn’t work and my Plex server was unreachable. I don’t know if it could be related to the fact that my /home directory lives on a different drive than the rest of my Ubuntu install and/or that my Plex media lives on a NAS that is mounted to the Plex server. Somehow in attempting this fairly simple change and then reverting it I managed to delete some parts of my home folder. When I rebooted my server it had removed all my desktop settings (favorites, Firefox profile, etc.). I have absolutely no idea how I could have done that. I searched the entire server and can’t find those deleted files anywhere.

The good news is that I got the final parts for my new Unraid server today. I was originally going to keep Plex on the HP, but I think I’ll try integrating it into a docker setup on the Unraid box and see how it goes.

Thanks for trying to help me.

6

Copy/paste is VASTLY different than tar. It breaks all the metadata links.

7

Hey man, I’m piggybacking this thread as I’m also having trouble while following the same instructions, hope that’s ok. I followed a similar instructions like yours, with the exception that the warning about not using /media folder wasn’t there. I copied the metadata folder to a /media folder on another SSD, and change the path via systemd. However, my server never was able to start

  • sudo systemctl start plexmediaserver
  • Job for plexmediaserver.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
  • See “systemctl status plexmediaserver.service” and “journalctl -xe” for details.

Do you think it’s because I use /media folder? /media seems to be the root of my new SSD. Does this mean I need to figure out how to export my /home folder from my original SSD to the new one first, before attempting metadata transfer again? Please advise.

8

Can you show me your df output?

Also please show me where you put things?

If you put your metadata on /media and didn’t set it up manually in /etc/fstab then YES, it’s the root of the evils.

9

Looks like I might have gotten it solved. I managed to start over and created a new folder for plex under /mnt and assigned permission 777 to make my life easier. Looks like it works now, edited systemd, loaded it and my library is intact!

Thanks for responding. I’ll let you know if things were still broken.

10

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